


flooded lungs

by bethica



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, First Meetings, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Sad Dan Howell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-19 02:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10630473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethica/pseuds/bethica
Summary: the usual 2009, long-distance meeting story- but Dan has Hanahaki disease, where unrequited love causes someone to cough up flowers, until the love becomes requited... or they suffocate.Dan is angsty, phil is sweet, and yellow tulips are everywhere.tw: blood, vomiting, references to depression/suicidal thoughts





	

**Author's Note:**

> I just stumbled across the Hanahaki Disease AU while I was bingeing yoi fics, and I got #inspired to write it for phan. some of the victuuri fics I was inspired by are grassepi’s “[Blue Petals, Silver Thorns](http://archiveofourown.org/works/8965381/chapters/20507404),” stxmph’s “[never been to peru](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8832328),” and “[forget-me-nots](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9036446)” by intertwingular. be sure to check out those amazing fics if you’re yoi trash like I am.
> 
> otherwise, please enjoy!! this is my first fic, so pleasepleaseplease comment if you can !
> 
> (obviously, this is an au, so I’ve taken some liberties with the phan timeline, etc)
> 
> tw: blood, vomiting, references to depression/suicidal thoughts

The Hanahaki Disease is an illness born from one-sided love, where the patient throws up and coughs of flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love. The plant grows in their lungs and spreads through through their body, becoming deadly if not treated. The disease can only go away if the love becomes requited, or if the plant is removed through surgery, but the feelings and memories of the love disappear along with the petals.

Dan had always considered himself pretty lucky, as far as love was concerned. As he entered secondary school, and his classmates and friends began coughing up petals in every color of the rainbow, he found himself blissfully removed from that particular realm of discomfort.

Even though Hanahaki had the potential to be fatal, it so rarely was, particularly in school, when teenagers and unrequited love are practically inextricable. Most adults looked on someone’s “first blooms” as a kind of rite of passage: a first love, and first heartbreak. While hormone-fueled passions can be powerful, they’re also almost always brief, with intense feelings fading away almost as quickly, or becoming requited for a lucky handful.

While Dan had had a girlfriend, they both thankfully reached what they thought of as love at around the same time. Or maybe it never truly was love. He never really knew, since they parted ways before he left for university, and he left whatever feelings he did have for her in the past. Sure, he had a handful of crushes on other people, but nothing that crossed that unspoken barrier between “infatuation” and “love.”

He had coasted through secondary school, never really becoming close with anyone, never really connecting. He had a handful of friends he’d hang out with, and a couple of brief romantic interludes, but Dan remained mostly unattached. Lonely, sure, but unattached.  
It was simpler this way, he thought. He had watched as his friends and acquaintances had their hearts broken, watched as supposed “best friends” had drifted apart, and seen the pain it caused. He was okay with being alone—for now, at least. Someday, he hoped he would find someone. But he wasn’t in a hurry.

That was what he told himself, anyways. Told his parents who wondered at his lonesomeness, told the counselor his parents had forced him to see when she asked, in a calming and level voice, “And why do you think you avoid close relationships, Daniel?”

But he knew that wasn’t really why. It wasn’t so much a dark and hidden thought as it was a surface level one, repeating and repeating on a never-ending loop. You’re not good enough. You don’t deserve anyone. You’ll just end up disappointing, hurting, breaking them. Making their lives worse. And on the days when it was really bad, better to not let them get attached. You’ll likely be gone sooner rather than later.

After graduation, there were no more daily classes and no more existing “friendships” and acquaintanceships to maintain. He could tell his family was concerned, but he was fine! No one had ever claimed that Dan Howell was an outgoing person.

Without the pressure of school, he dived into the internet culture he had been on the fringes of for so long. For years and years he had obsessively followed his favorite channels, and watched as the YouTube community slowly grew and grew.

And through it all, there was Phil. AmazingPhil. Older, with better hair, funny, good-looking, educated, confident in himself. He seemed like an incredible person. And he was a YouTuber! Everything Dan wished he could be.

Since anxiety somehow managed to spread into his internet life as well, it took months before he could build up the courage to comment on one of the videos. But he did.  
And miracle of all miracles: Phil responded.

Tweet after tweet, comment after comment, Dan would say something, desperately trying to seem funny or interesting. And Phil would reply.

It was almost like something out of a dream.

And as the messages got flirtier, more suggestive, Dan could feel himself falling. ‘Just another crush!’ he told himself. ‘A dumb crush.’ And maybe that’s what it was, at first. But then things changed.

And on the day when he suggested they Skype, as soon as they hung up, Dan felt a strange tickle in the back of his throat.

Phil had been there, really there, talking, laughing, joking. With him! In person! Well, over the internet. But still!

He was kind, and funny, and (goddamn it), pretty cute. And he seemed so genuinely interested in Dan, and everything he had to say. And as his nerves gradually melted away, and he could feel a blush rising in his cheeks, Dan knew he was falling.

And, as if to prove it, there was that petal. After a minute of hacking coughs, there it was. A flawless and intact yellow petal. It was smooth and bright, the color of a perfect summer’s day. And Dan had just coughed it up from deep, deep inside his lungs.

‘This is ridiculous,’ was the only thought that kept running through his head. Hanahaki was for lopsided relationships, or hormone addled teenagers. He was supposed to be mature, above this. But here he was.

It had to be for Phil. There was no other rational explanation. Phil, who was practically a celebrity. Phil, who lived a somewhat inconvenient 300 kilometers away. Phil, whom he had never met face to face and had only spoken with once in real life!

This was humiliating. There was no way he could tell Phil, obviously. And telling his parents would involve conversations about his sexuality that he was not yet ready to have.

But, as he was quickly realizing, this was also slightly concerning. As the Skype calls grew longer and longer, and the coughing fits more frequent and more difficult to hide, Dan began to understand that these feelings likely weren’t going away anytime soon.

They had never really talked about their feelings. Not explicitly, anyways. As Dan hesitantly started his own channel and began to open up more and more to Phil, he could tell that something was changing.

He still didn’t love himself. And he still knew that he was nowhere near worthy of love from someone as good and kind as Phil, so it was probably better that he had Hanahaki rather than have his feelings be requited. But Phil insisted that he was wrong.

Dan was kind, said Phil. He was funny, and good, and talented, and intelligent, and wonderful to talk to, and a good friend. And Dan knew that all those things weren’t true, still didn’t really believe them. But the more he heard them, the less ridiculous it seemed. Maybe, even if he didn’t really deserve love, he still didn’t deserve his own hate, either.

It still didn’t change the fact that Phil Lester didn’t love Dan Howell, though. And that hurt—both emotionally, every time Dan shoved his face into his pillow to stifle his heaving sobs, and physically, as less and less time was spent breathing normally, and more and more time was spent wheezing and vomiting a spray of broken yellow tulips into the nearest toilet.

His parents noticed, of course. There was only so long that he could hide the fact that he could scarcely go a few hours without coughing up flowers. But Hanahaki wasn’t abnormal, per se. Most people, especially teenagers, went through it. And Dan had never been one to open up to his parents, so they didn’t question it. They just smiled sadly and understandingly every time he excused himself to the bathroom for the umpteenth time, retching as entire tulip heads, and eventually pieces of stem and leaves, made their way out of his lungs.

Hanahaki worsens as feelings grow deeper. And as the months went by, and Dan and Phil grew closer and closer, Dan only grew worse. His throat was constantly raw and stinging, and even when there were no flowers, he would often cough up blood. Looking at the dark red stains on the tissue for the first time, Dan couldn’t help but be faintly reminded of TB patients in Victorian times.

They would cough daintily into their handkerchiefs, deathly and fashionably pale, their slow deaths romanticized by a society that idolized the highly contagious disease and the supposed creative genius it brought.

But Dan noticed no creative genius, or any other benefits to speak of. This much he knew: he was head over heels for Philip Michael Lester, and there was absolutely no way that the older man could know.

The only thing worse than the pity he knew Phil would give him, the young fan who had fallen hopelessly in love with someone older and more famous, would be the guilt he knew Phil would feel. Hurting Phil was the last thing he wanted.

So he pressed on, continuing to do his best to hide his illness from the person he now considered his best friend.

As months passed, the coughing was nearly constant. Bouquets and bouquets of bloodied, torn tulips in the same shade of vibrant yellow forced their way through his windpipe, leaving hauntingly beautiful trails throughout his house as he would frantically make his way to the toilet. 

His parents became more insistent, concerned about the growing severity of this disease that was supposed to be a teenager’s trifle, but Dan shut down every time they brought it up.  
This was his to bear. He couldn’t even consider the surgery; his friendship with Phil had been the one bright spot in what had otherwise been a miserable year. To take away the feelings that had grown was unthinkable.

Maybe he would fall out of love with Phil. Or maybe, just maybe, the tulips would take him first. That wouldn’t be so bad, would it? His parents would be upset, but he wasn’t their only child. And Phil would be sad, certainly, but he didn’t love him, so the loss couldn’t hurt him too badly.

This was the best option, Dan was sure. Best for everybody.

By the time Phil suggested they meet in person, Dan knew he didn’t have much time left. His parents whispered with doctors, who tried to get him to agree to the surgery, but he refused. He accepted the throat numbing spray they gave him, trying to take away some of the pain. But even that did little to stop the flowers.

They were constantly there, his eyesight always filled with a blur of yellow petals and vivid green stems, and flashes of red. He could barely sleep without being wracked by coughing fits; he couldn’t keep down much water, let alone food.

By November, Dan swayed when he stood. His once-tanned skin was pale, and violet bruises bloomed from the now-frequent fainting when his body had failed to get the oxygen it needed to stay conscious. His voice was rasping, and talking became so painful that he rarely spoke aloud. Everyone around him, Dan included, knew there wasn’t much time left.

He had avoided Skyping once things started downhill, instead messaging and texting to desperately try to keep Phil blissfully unaware. When Phil suggested he visit Manchester, Dan was torn. Was he really willing to put his friend through seeing him like this? Willing to risk Phil realizing the cause? Eventually, though, he agreed. (As if there had ever been any doubt.) There was no way he could die without having been able to meet his idol, his best friend, his love, at least once.

Dan didn’t tell his parents, or the few acquaintances he still had. They would have never allowed it. But he set off on the train for Manchester, alone, choosing a seat strategically close to the train’s restroom.

And hours later, he finally arrived. The sighing train heaved into the station, loaded with impatient passengers. And, with it, Dan Howell arrived in Manchester, stepping shakily onto the platform, anxious and excited and nervous and feeling as though he were about to pass out.

And there was Phil, black hair bobbing above the crowd. He stepped around a pram, beaming, waving, sprinting towards Dan and enveloping him in the tightest, warmest, best hug of his life.

“How was the trip? Are you feeling alright? You look poorly,” observed Phil, concerned, as he held Dan by the shoulders.

Even though he could already feel the tickle of a tulip at the back of his throat, Dan couldn’t stop a smile from spreading across his thin face. “I’m alright. Feeling better now though, actually. A lot better.”

Phil grinned again, wrapping Dan in a quick hug once more. And as he began to babble excitedly about Manchester and their plans for the weekend and lead Dan out of the station, a deep sense of peace settled over Dan’s exhausted frame. He was here, and he was with Phil, and Phil was happy to see him, and that was what mattered most.

Phil was laughing, and he was there and he was real and warm and bright and solid, and this whole experience was surreal. Finally, hesitantly, Dan reached over and lightly brushed his fingers against Phil’s. Phil jumped at the contact, but then smiled a soft and knowing smile, and he quickly intertwined his fingers with Dan’s.

And as Dan and Phil stepped out into Manchester together, Dan was suddenly overwhelmed with the intense and convincing belief that things were going to be alright.

**Author's Note:**

> in terms of flower meanings:
> 
> yellow tulips = used to mean "hopeless love," now generally associated with "perfect love." 
> 
> also, s/o to nah_grass for being a fabulous beta!! thank!


End file.
